O. Roy Chalk (7
June 1907 – 1 December 1995) was a wealthy entrepreneur and art
collector.1 He and his wife Claire purchased the Delapierre portrait from the estate of Mrs. Josef Stransky at an
auction at Parke-Bernet Galleries (now Sotheby's) in New York on the afternoon of 16 October 19542—just a few hours after Hurricane Hazel grazed the city.

The
Chalks owned the painting jointly until his death in New York at the age of 88.
She sold it at an auction at C.G. Sloan & Company in Maryland on the
afternoon of 14 April 1996.3

In 1962, Chalk traveled to France to purchase the plaster bust of Thomas Jefferson sculpted by Jean-Antoine Houdon in 1789 that now resides at Monticello.
That bust, which was exhibited at the "Salon de 1789" in Paris just before
Jefferson left to return to America, is considered by experts to be the finest
Houdon bust of Jefferson known to exist.4

And,
even though Jefferson's daughter (Martha Jefferson Randolph) criticized the
bust for making Jefferson look too old,5 it is considered by many experts to
be the most accurate likeness of Jefferson ever created. A later marble copy of
Chalk's bust was used as the model for the "Jefferson Nickel." 6

When Christie's sold the Chalk bust
at auction in New York on 29 May 1987, it became the most expensive portrait
bust ever sold and set an all-time record for a piece of pre-20th-century
sculpture.7

Chalk's Art Collection and Other Interests

Chalk
and his wife owned and lived in a 16-story apartment building on Fifth Avenue
in New York—directly across the street from the Metropolitan Museum of
Art—that Chalk purchased for $1,000,000 in 1942.8 They amassed an art collection that
included notable works by Vincent van Gogh, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Mary Cassatt,
and other distinguished artists.9

The
Chalks donated the famous 38-carat "Chalk Emerald" to the Smithsonian Natural History
Museum in Washington, D.C., in 1972. (It is displayed there next to the "Hope
Diamond.")10

From 1956 to 1973, Chalk owned D.C. Transit, which at the time was the predominant
bus and streetcar company in Washington, D.C.11

Late
in his life, Chalk became a highly paid Washington lobbyist for the Republic of
Russia.12 Following the dissolution of the
Soviet Union, he is credited by some as having helped draft the Constitution of the Russian Federation, ratified on 12 December 1993.13

Is It Significant That Chalk Owned Both the
Delapierre Portrait and Houdon Bust?

The fact that Chalk owned both the 1785
Delapierre portrait and 1789 Houdon bust of Jefferson for many years may be
coincidence. To date, the research team has found no evidence that Chalk had
evidence—or even suspected—that the Delapierre subject was Jefferson.

Nonetheless, Chalk's prominence and
proximity to the Metropolitan Museum of Art afforded him the means to do
extensive research, possibly allowing him to uncover some of the details
discovered by our team.

Moreover,
Chalk's stealth was legendary. Had his research led
him to conclude that the Delapierre subject was Jefferson, that judgment might
have motivated him to later seek out and purchase the 1789 Houdon bust of
Jefferson in Paris.14 But
he may well have kept his views on the Delapierre portrait to himself.15

[2] Parke-Bernet auction catalog (French
XVIII Century Furniture and Objects of Art, Friday & Saturday, October 15
& 16 at 1:45 p.m., 980 Madison Avenue, New York, 1954), page 56, item
number 258 (illustrated), signed and dated 1785. Curiously, the painting was
misattributed in the catalog to the artist "Jean-Baptiste
Marie Pierre" (French: 1713-1789). This may have been due to misinterpretation of the signature by
experts at Parke-Bernet Galleries—or perhaps was because the signature was
not clearly legible when they received the portrait. In any event, the
first correct attribution known to the research team—in sources dating back to and including
the Ugo Bardini letters of 1927 and 1928—occurred in April 1996, when C.G.
Sloan & Company in Bethesda, Maryland, offered the portrait for sale (on
behalf of Mrs. O. Roy Chalk) in an auction catalog.

[13] Several websites indicate that Chalk
helped Russia draft its first constitution after the breakup of the USSR;
however, the research team has not been able to confirm this information.

[14] Chalk's purchase of
the renowned 1789 Houdon bust of Jefferson suggests that his primary
interest was the subject rather than the
artist, because other fine busts by Houdon would have
been much easier to procure at the time. According to
Professor Alfred L. Bush (Jefferson and the Arts: An Extended View...The
Life Portraits of Thomas Jefferson, National Gallery of Art, Washington,
D.C., 1976, p. 32): "...in 1963, the French Fine Arts Administration provided
an export permit for a plaster acquired by Roy Chalk of Washington, [D.C.] but only
after another [Jefferson bust by Houdon] was donated to the French government
by Edmond Courty."

[15] When Chalk's wife Claire inherited the portrait
following his death, she may not have been aware of what he knew about the item.
Efforts by the research team to discover more about O. Roy Chalk's knowledge or
opinions concerning the 1785 Delapierre portrait have not been successful.